Lovely Family Dinner

Yesterday my mom and dad had a birthday dinner for me at their house with my siblings. It was lots of fun. We have all been feeling a little under the weather at my house so it was nice to get out and spend time with the fam. We had a delicious meal and then we opened some presents. Thank you so much to Sherri for the way cute bunny figurings and thanks to Julie for the cute card holder (so creative) and thanks to mom for the fun make up. It was a fun night.
We then had a really good chocolate cake from Costco. It was so rich that a little sliver of cake way totally enough, good stuff. It was lots of fun to spend time just chatting with everyone and enjoying each others company. I love my family so much, every one of them. We all have our own personalities and feelings and I have learned so much from all of my family members. We are far from perfect, but we all love each other! Thanks to my family for thinking about me and making me feel special on my special day. I love you all.

Happy Birthday to me...

And Happy Valentine's Day to all. Most people would like to have a nice relaxing birthday where they get pampered and it is all roses and chocolate (especially when your birthday is on Valentine's Day)...but that is not the kind of day that I have had so far. After having a terrible night last night with Tyler all by my self because Tony was camping with the boy scouts, I have been so tired all day. Tyler decided to not want to sleep and then cried so hard that he threw up (yummy), and then was restless all night. So then, of course, he didn't sleep in at all and was pretty grumpy. I did notice that when he woke up he had a lot of green goop (I'm sure that's the medical term for it) in his eye. So that's not good. I wasn't too concerned about it (even though I should have been) so we went on with our morning like usual.
When I woke up it was snowing pretty good and already had a couple inches on the ground. It snowed until about 11ish. I love the snow and wish it would snow more when it is winter time. I don't really care for the snow when it is suppose to be spring time, however. Any who...so Tony got home about 12:15 and we got ready to go to the temple. We drove Tyler to my mom's (thanks mom for watching him - you're a life saver) and then went to the Jordan River Temple. It was a beautiful ceremony and it was so wonderful to see that cute family be sealed for eternity. We are so blessed to have that opportunity.
After the temple, Tony and I went to lunch and it was really good. Then we went to pick up Tyler and his eye was looking pretty bad. My mom told me that my sister's kids had pink eye this week and that Tyler probably had that too. AWESOME, I thought. So we took him to the Urgent Care and waited for about a hour there before the doctor saw Tyler. By then Tyler didn't want anything to do with any of the medical people and threw a fit when they tried to do anything to him. So the doc said that his ear looked a little red and gave us a prescription for eye drops and Amoxacilion. Isn't that fun!?! Then we came home and Tony gave me some delicious chocolate covered caramel hearts and we have just been hanging out ever sense. Tony did find some cheap Valentine's Day balloons at the store when he got Tylers prescription and Tyler has been having so much fun playing with them.
So with throw up, lack of sleep, temple fun, doctors office, and chilling at home it has been a pretty crazy day. I hope Tyler feels better soon and that life goes back to normal quickly. Birthday dinner at my parents tomorrow should make for an excellent way to end my birthday. Good bye 27 and Hello 28!

Mama needs a break...

Today Tyler decided to take a 10 minute nap. I am sorry, but that is not enough time for me to get any work done, let a lone get a real break from Tyler. That sounds terrible, but I need some time for me to do whatever I need to do. I totally have tons more patience and am a better mom when Tyler takes a good nap and sleeps well at night. Sleeping is a wondering thing.

Who needs a diaper?

Tony has to go to Klondike tomorrow. So once he gets home from work tomorrow then he leaves to go camping in the snow (crazy) and then he wont be back until Saturday at noon. It would have been later, but some friends of ours are getting sealed in the temple on Saturday and they invited us to come. So we have to be there at 1:30. We are so happy for them. Getting sealed on Valentines Day, that is so sweet. So Tyler had better take a nap tomorrow or I might go crazy...if I am not already...okay, I am a little bit.

Oh what a fun time

On Saturday I went and saw my little sister, Teagan, in a musical at the Junior High. She did really good and it was fun to go with my family and cheer her on. Kevin took a date, Teagan's math teacher - so funny - and Teagan's little boyfriend was there and he sat in between my mom and Sherri's husband, Richard, during the play. Funny stuff. After the play, we went to Leatherby's and had some ice cream. It was really fun to get to know Kevin's date and Teagan's boyfriend. I guess I talked a little too much to his date and he felt like he didn't get to do much talking. Upps, you know me, I'm a talker.

Okay, so based on Roseanne's recommendation, we have started to do some sleep training with Tyler. Super Nanny suggests putting the kid in the bed and then just putting him back every time he gets out of the bed until he gives up and goes to sleep. Well, Tony did this on Saturday night and it took an hour and a half for Tyler to actually go to sleep. So then on Sunday we tried it again and Tyler was crying a lot, but Tony stayed in the room and Tyler fell a sleep after not too long. Then Monday came and we started him in the bed and then he started to cry and got out of the bed, but then Tony was staying in there (just sitting on his toy chest) and then I went in and sat on Tylers floor (to relieve Tony) and then Tyler feel asleep after about 20 or so minutes. So, long story short we have kind of been doing a softer approach to the Super Nanny thing and just sitting in there with him until he goes to sleep. It will probably take longer for him to fully be able to sleep by him self, but I am okay with that. Especially if it means less screaming.

Oh, the trama....

Tyler is really struggling with sleeping. Some nights it is really hard to get him to go to sleep and then he always wakes up in the middle of the night and comes in with us. Before he used to have me rock him to sleep and then he would be good until he woke up and came in with us, but now he goes from rocking to "I want to lay in my own bed" to "I didn't go to sleep as fast as I thought I would so I want to go and rock again" to an hour later I am still trying to get Tyler to go to sleep ---- AAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH! It is driving me nuts. I try to make him stay in his bed and then he cries so hard that he makes him self throw up, no fun at all. I don't really know what to do any more...maybe I am trying to put him to bed too early when he is not tired enough? Who knows. I will have to try to let him stay up longer and see if that helps. Really, he needs to learn to sleep better - for the sake of us all!

On a different note, we have been having some crazy weather. We had some awesome fog come in one night from no where. It came in so fast and was so thick. So we got out the camera and got some cool pictures. We don't usually see tons of fog, especially at night, so it was fun to see it so thick.

Luckily, now we are just having cold weather. The air was so bad for so long I hated going outside and letting Tyler play. He loves it outside, but I worried about our health. I did take him on a couple walks during the icky air weeks and I totally could tell a difference. I think that made us both a lot sicker then we would have been. But then the storm came and took all the bad air away...and now it is just cold. I think that if it is going to be cold, then it should snow. Then at least it is pretty and cold. I really do like the snow, it hasn't snowed much lately though. Okay that is boring...

Jazz Game

On Tuesday Tony, Tyler, and myself went to a Jazz game with my sister Sherri and her husband Richard. Richards brother, Mark Madsen, plays for the Timberwolves and so he was able to get us some tickets for the game. It was tons of fun. We met up with Sherri and Richard at the Trax station and then took Trax down to the ESA (I still totally think of it as the Delta Center). That was Tyler's first time on Trax and he really enjoyed the ride.
Once we got there we had to pick up the tickets from Will Call, and then we headed to our seats. We had really good seats on the side behind the basketball hoop. We even had the blow up things that you whack together to distract the player trying to make a free throw. At first I was really worried that Tyler would get bored and restless, but he did really good. He LOVED playing with the blow up sticks and climbing in and out of his seat. He loves balls and did really good watching part of the game. We were close enough that he could see the players playing really well and pointed out the ball a lot.
It was a really close game too. Mark didn't get to play, so that was too bad, but we did get to go and talk with him after the game. That was fun to wait around and see some of the players. We had to put on special stickers that allowed us to stay there after the game. We had met Mark before and he is always such a nice guy. After that we went back to the Trax and went home. It was a really fun night and we are way thankful to Sherri and Richard for thinking of us and letting us go and see the game.

Being sick sucks!

I really don't enjoy being sick, but what I really HATE is when Tyler is sick. Usually Tyler is the one that picks up the sickness and then passes it on the me so that we can be sick together. He's a good sharer. It is probably my own fault, who can stop kissing and loving on their baby just because they are sick? No one!
Tyler and I have been sick with a stupid cold for the past couple of weeks. It started out not too bad and totally under control, but then it got worse. Tyler spiked a really high fever and was just not happy. So I took him to the doctors on Wednesday and she said that she thinks that this might be two separate colds. She checked his ears (which is the main reason we went to his doctors, to check for an ear infection) and she said that one of his ears looked red. He hates getting his ears checked so he always cries a lot when she does it. So she said it didn't look way bad, but that we should treat the infection. So we got some medicine, which he has hated taking and we practically have to gag it down is throat. It is so much fun -- okay not really. But I am happy to say after a couple really bad days, he is starting to feel better. I didn't have to give him any Motrin yesterday or today.
I must say that I am so thankful for Tony and his priesthood. Tyler was hurting so bad and just so upset one night and Tony gave him a blessing (which was not easy because he kept moving all over the place and screaming) and then within maybe 10-15 minutes he had calmed down. You don't realize what a blessing it is having a healthy child until they are sick. So Tyler and I are slowing, but surely starting to feel better. Luckily, knock on wood, Tony has not gotten sick from us and hopefully it will stay that way.

Odds and Ends

We have been working on our house for a long time now. We moved in five years ago and have been busy making things more up to date. Most of the major stuff is done, but each room upstairs still has some odds and ends that need to be done to "finish" the room. We have decided to work on the kitchen first, since that is the room we just redid. We need to do some quarter round on the bottom of the cabinets and new window seals where their is currently ugly tile. We also bought some handles and knobs to put on the cabinets.
In the other rooms we are going to put up crown molding and put in a new fire place cover that small children can't play with. We would also like to put in closet organizers in some of the closets. It will be really nice when those things are all done. Don't get me wrong, I love my house and the things that Tony has already done, but those finishing touches with just be the icing on the cake. We just have to take things one room at a time and as we can afford to do things. Tony's parents gave a gift card to Home Depot for Christmas, so that got us the crown molding for the front room and the handles and knobs for the kitchen cabinets. Thank you to them for helping us make our house better. Plus all this gives Tony a good reason to use his new miter saw that I bought him!

Snow days are fun days

It snowed a couple of inches last night so we decided to enjoy it before it got too cold and Tyler had a wonderful time. He just loves being outside. It doesn't matter the weather with that kid. Tony and I had fun watching him walk on all the neighbors snow and make such cute little foot prints every where. It was only about 27 degrees and he didn't seem to mind at all. He really wanted to play basketball, he kept saying "ball...ball" and pointing to the hoop that we have outside. It is way too big for Tyler, but we are planning on getting him one more his size for his birthday in March - if he can wait that long. We finally got tired of being outside and then came back into the warmth. Now Tyler is sleeping like a baby and we are enjoying some quiet time. I really do love this time of year.

Find of the year...

We have been looking for a play set for Tyler to play with for a while now. We started looking in the summer, but everything was too expensive for us to buy. We saw this cute Clubhouse set at Sam's Club for $500. That was just too much money to justify spending on a play set. So we have been checking KSL.com in their classified section to see if we could buy a used play set. It seemed like every time something perfect for Tyler would come along, someone else would buy it first. So we decided to go to Sam's Club two days before Christmas to see if any of their toys were on sale yet. We didn't really find any toys, but we found this Clubhouse set for $225. It sales for $600 online. We couldn't pass up that kind of deal. So we bought it and then Tony borrowed his parents truck and took it home.
We decided to only set up the right third of the play set, with the slide, in our computer room and then put the green climber in the opening. Tyler LOVES it. He is having so much fun with it, I just can't wait until summer to set the whole thing up outside. That will be a fun day at the Steenblik house. So it pays to wait. It says that it is for 2 - 8 years of age, so it will last our family a long time before we then need to upgrade to something bigger (well knowing Tyler it will probably only be a couple years before he is needing something larger). We also went back to Sam's Club a couple days after Christmas and got a tricycle for like $20 off. Most the time we aren't huge Sam's Club fans, but sometimes it is the best. Oh yeah, Happy New Years!